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Thursday, June 7, 2007

Green Tea Cheesecake White Chocolate Brownie

Green tea is one of my favorite flavors for sweets, from cakes, cheesecakes, puddings, ice cream (I can't tell you how much I adore green tea mochi ice cream), to drinks like milkshakes and frappucinos (I would be drinking this stuff 24/7 if only it wasn't so expensive and not to mention fattening). Up until a few years ago, its use as a dessert flavor was fairly localized to Asia but now it's growing in popularity around the world, working its way into very French desserts like macarons and madeleines. I received my bag of green tea (matcha) powder a long time ago from Steven's parents who brought it back from Taiwan. It is absolutely precious to me so rather than using it, the bag of matcha sat untouched safely in the pantry. A few days ago I looked at the bag again, and although it was entirely in Japanese, from what I could understand it expired last month. Ack! Now I need to use up the powder and there's no excuse for letting it sit around, so stay tuned for a flurry of green tea sweets.

I never understood blondies. It seems only natural that if brownies are made with chocolate, then blondies should be made with white chocolate. Instead, blondies are more like bar cookies made with brown sugar and chocolate chips rather than melted white chocolate. So this leaves the poor white chocolate brownie without a proper name. It's a tragedy. :( As a result, this dessert has an abnormally long name, but I can't think of anything better. This will be my entry for Myriam's 2nd Browniebabe of the Month. Helen and Meeta also made white chocolate brownies, we must all be on the same Daring Baker vibe.

Notes:- Matcha powder can be quite expensive especially the high quality stuff used for tea ceremonies, baking quality matcha is often more affordable.- The green tea cheesecake swirls can be omitted for a regular white chocolate brownie/blondie- The amount of matcha you need will depend on its strength. Since mine is really weak (perhaps due to the expiration date), I had to use almost 2 tablespoons in the cheesecake filling, but this is highly unusual. Usually 1 to 2 teaspoons of matcha is enough so start out with a little bit and taste it. - The brownies were almost a tad too dense (I usually really love fudgy brownies) but next time I will add 1/4 tsp of baking powder to the batter.- When I made these I was expecting something identical to a regular brownie but with white chocolate flavor. However, the texture of these brownies was very different from what I was expecting, I can't put my finger on it exactly. I think it might have to do with the different proportions of cocoa butter and other stuff in white chocolate vs. semi/bittersweet. They also didn't have a crust on top.

Mix the green tea powder with a bit of hot water to form a paste. Mix the cream cheese, egg, and green tea paste until smooth. Taste a bit and see if it's strong enough.

Melt the butter with the white chocolate. Mix in the sugar, eggs, vanilla, and flour (and baking powder if you want to experiment with it). Whisk until smooth but do not over mix.

Line a 8 x 8 square baking dish with a sheet of foil (with overhang for easy lifting) or grease and flour it. Pour in half of the white chocolate batter. Then drop half of the cream cheese mixture on top in spoonfuls. Top the batter with the rest of the white chocolate brownie batter, then finally add the remaining half of the cream cheese mixture on top. Use a knife and swirl the brownie and cream cheese together to create a marbled pattern.

Bake the brownies at 325ºF for 40 - 45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with moist crumbs. The center should be almost set. You don't want the toothpick to come out clean because that would mean the brownies have overbaked. Cool in the pan for 5 then lift the brownies out and cool to room temperature. They're best served cold so chill them in the fridge for about 3 hours.

42 comments:

Those looks super delicious Amy! Great picture! Yummmmmmmm, I'd sooooo love one of those right now... :) ... And yeah the Starbucks Green Tea Frap is my favorite too.... I haven't had any green tea dessert so far, but if it tastes anything like the frappucino, I'd love it...

Sig,I love the fruitiness of the green tea fraps. Green tea ice cream is probably a nice dessert to start with. They sell those mochi ice creams at Tjs and Costco. :D

Bettina,I love white chocolate and green tea. :)

Jason,I was very shocked also. A lot of recipes I looked at only called for a teaspoon or two for a whole cake and such. I'm guessing my green tea powder wasn't strong or high quality to begin with and over time it lost a lot of potency. Which is why I recommend starting out with just 2 teaspoons but I made a note I had to use a lot. Maybe I should get rid of that note as to not confuse people. :( The brownies weren't exposed to too much light but the greenness wasn't very apparent to begin with. Perhaps some of the color baked away in the oven? I guess I need to use up this old matcha and buy some new stuff. :D

Jaden,I alternated pouring in the brownie batter and dropped dollops of the cream cheese mixture. Then I took the tip of a butter knife and cut into the batter and swirled the knife around. I made some lines, drew some circles, basically just moved the knife around haphazardly, lol.

Culinary CuriousI'll have to make a note in the recipe to not use as much matcha as I did. But I hope you like it!

WC,That is a great idea! Omg, I'm totally going to do it since I need to use up the matcha and I have some white chocolate left. Awesome!

Interesting article. Has learnt new about advantage of green tea. In the blog http://bad-breath-and-green-tea.blogspot.com/ devoted to curative properties of green tea I will necessarily put the reference to your blog.

Thanks for this! I added the baking powder, but might leave it out next time...the "brownie" part turned out like cake (but it is the most delicious cake i have ever had!!). My matcha was weak and in limited supply, so I think i'm gonna have to take a second stab at this =/But I'm thinking of taking that white chocolate brownie recipe and adding the matcha straight to it....yummmm! (btw, i LOVE your blog, you post such yummy stuff and beautiful pictures!)

Dani,Thanks for testing the recipe with the baking powder. Maybe next time I make this I'll cut the baking powder down to 1/8th tsp because I think without it, the brownie is just a tad too dense. Adding the matcha directly would be very delicious! I'm glad you enjoyed this!

The cheesecake looks delicious. I want to taste it for sure. The ingredients you have added to them are healthy products, which is the most important thing everyone must understand. I love green tea a lot both for its taste and their benefits for health.Nice sharing and keep posting.

I'm so excited about this recipe! I was trying to find a recipe that would make a good gift to professors who have written grad school recommendations for me, and this is perfect--especially since I'm a Japan Studies major!! lol

My brownies are in the oven right now, and I'm so excited to see how they come out!

it looks super yumm. i have a querry. i noticed u mentioned sugar as one of the ingridients for the cheesecake but in the prepration section u havent mentioned sugar.i tried the recepie without the sugar since and only later noticed the sugar in the ingridients section.

You might be interested to know this photo is all over pinterest labeled (incorrectly) as "white chocolate brownies" and linking to a recipe that is CLEARLY not the picture/correct... it took me a bit of photo sleuthing to find the correct recipe... and now i see the green tea element.... hmmm what would happen if I omitted it because I actually WAS looking for a white chocolate brownie... have you ever tried?